What Is a Redirect? Sending One URL to Another
DICTIONARY · SEO

What Is a Redirect?

A redirect sends a visitor and a crawler from one URL to another, and tells them whether the move is permanent.

In plain English

Redirects are how you change a URL without losing the traffic and links pointing at the old one. Which status code you use tells search engines whether to update their index.

The problems are almost never the redirect itself. They are chains built over successive migrations, and loops where two URLs point at each other.

What to know

Permanent or temporary
301 for permanent, 302 for temporary. The choice changes what gets indexed.
One hop
A to B. Never A to B to C to D.
Preserve equity
A single well-implemented redirect passes almost all of the value.
Map before migrating
Every changing URL needs a documented destination.

Why it matters

Redirect discipline is what separates a migration that keeps its traffic from one that loses a third of it. The work is unglamorous mapping, and it is the single most important part of any URL change.

Common mistakes

×Redirecting everything to the homepage instead of the relevant page.
×Chains accumulated across several site changes.
×Using 302 for permanent moves, so the old URL stays indexed.
×Migrating without a URL map and fixing it afterwards from a 404 report.

FAQs

How many redirects in a chain is too many?

More than one is worth fixing. Search engines follow a limited number of hops.

Should deleted pages redirect?

If a relevant equivalent exists, yes. If nothing is equivalent, return a proper 404 or 410.

WRITTEN BY TARIQ SALLAM
Marketing Consultant. Entrepreneur. Content Creator.

I'm a marketing consultant, entrepreneur and content creator. I help businesses grow through practical marketing, websites, SEO, content and AI.

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